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Shenzhen, China– At lunchtime, a group of young people in their 20s wandered around Tim Hortons and Tencent E-sports Cafe, a newly opened venue for displaying professional video games, located in the center of Shenzhen’s Nanshan Technology District.
Holding coffee, donuts and sandwiches, some curious tourists took photos with virtual images of professional players on the big screen, or watched e-sports matches on another screen on the same upholstered chair that gamers often use Replay.
According to the latest data quoted by the official news media “People’s Daily”, China is the largest e-sports market with more than 400 million fans and viewers. With such numbers, it seemed like a breeze to bet on such a venue a few months ago.
The problem is that although local and national governments have always supported the establishment of a game industry, competition to host competitions, and even allow universities to open e-sports courses, the new rules that came into effect on September 1 restrict anyone under the age of 18 from participating in games only three times a week. Hours, or one hour a day from Friday to Sunday at 8pm.
As state media and other government agencies describe video games as “mental opium,” the new restrictions appear to cause short-term and long-term damage to China’s gaming industry, and these long-term effects may be the most painful for professional e-sports.
This week, after the official news agency Xinhua reported that regulators had convened gaming companies including giants Tencent Holdings and NetEase to discuss the new restrictions, the Chinese government expressed its emphasis on enforcing the new rules.
Tim Hortons and Tencent E-sports Cafe in Shenzhen, China [Courtesy of Michael Standaert]Since 2018, the regulations requiring real-name authentication have been implemented, and after one year, the number of hours that teenagers can play games per day is limited to 1.5 hours. But the latest rules are stricter and may make teenagers lose interest in games more deeply.
“Because real-name authentication is required, new players who want to try the game anonymously before deciding to become ordinary players may be refused to try,” Shenzhen-based game developer Eason Zhang once participated in this field. For more than ten years, told Al Jazeera.
These restrictions three years ago have prompted game giants such as Tencent and NetEase to further expand overseas instead of focusing mainly on the Chinese market. This trend is expected to continue.
“This means that many Chinese game developers have shifted their focus to themselves, either developing games only for the domestic market, or trying to enter the global market industry, first launching localized or professional games globally, and then returning to the mainland. “Daniel Ahmed, an analyst at Niko Partners in London, told Al Jazeera.
China’s latest regulations restricting the time young people play video games are more stringent than previous measures, and have gone deeper in potentially weakening young people’s interest in games [Courtesy of Michael Standaert]Ahmed said that the impact of the latest restrictions on revenue is unlikely to erode the profits of the largest gaming companies. Only about 1% to 5% of revenue comes from about 110 million Chinese teenagers playing online video games. Approximately 97% of people aged 18 to 24 participate in the game in some way, and the short-term impact is unlikely to be significant.
“Games are part of culture, and China is the world’s largest game market,” he said. “For minors, this is not something that suddenly disappears overnight, although the restrictions are very harsh. It is still part of the culture. Now the parents of minors grew up in games, so their thinking Will be more enlightened and may be more willing to let children use their accounts to play games.”
Teenagers’ strong opposition on the Internet, comments on the social media network Weibo pointed out how unfair the policy is, and questioned how young people can now “relax” or even affect their creativity.
Some people jokingly mentioned the government’s other top-down policy initiatives, such as the three-child policy. A netizen wrote on Weibo: “For all adult gamers, don’t laugh at minors too much now, because who Know that one day there will be a policy that requires you to prove that you have a spouse and at least three children before you are allowed to log into your game.”
A Weibo user named “Betty” questioned the impact of the rule on the e-sports industry.
“How will it affect e-sports? Players are generally younger and have been “training” for many years. High school students who have just finished the college entrance examination [college entrance exams] Can’t play anymore. “
Young start
“Betty”‘s prediction that teenagers’ enthusiasm for games has diminished may be correct.
Scanning the resumes of professional e-sports players at Tim Hortons and Tencent e-sports cafes, people can take photos with them and find that most of them started playing games in their teens. Some people become professionals when they are 14 or 15 years old, using flexible fingers to fine-tune their motor skills and percussion ability.
People can take photos with professional e-sports players [Courtesy of Michael Standaert]Cui Chenyu, an analyst at Shanghai technology consulting firm Omdia, said: “Age restriction will cause many young professional players not to participate in e-sports, so I think this will be one of the main effects.” She told Al Jazeera: “These leagues train players to improve them. Game skills, and they were very young when they started.”
Ahmad wondered whether the severe restrictions mean that 18-year-olds will not have the gaming habits that they have developed in the past decade, which means that they may not play as much, spend as much or play games as their recent elders. Cui responded to the same concerns that the gaming industry will have to deal with.
“When they grow up, they are not used to playing[ing] For games, they may prefer to watch videos or live broadcasts, so when they grow up, games may no longer be an important part of their entertainment,” she said. “This is the long-term impact on the revenue growth of these companies. “
Johnny Chen, a former game developer in Shenzhen who has now switched to producing online novels, said that the previous restrictions have begun to change the habits of teenagers, and the latest rules will only further consolidate these changes.
“This will have a significant impact on the user base,” Chen said. “There won’t be as many players as before.”
Long-term problem
Although Ahmed and Cui both believe that the short-term impact is small, the problem of long-term impact still exists, especially for professional e-sports.
“There will definitely be some questions about what this means for the future of e-sports,” Ahmed said.
He said that since China recognized it as a sporting event in 2003, overall support for the industry has been strong.
Recent concerns about gaming addiction and more conservative leadership under Chinese President Xi Jinping, especially issues related to Chinese youth education, have caused senior officials to rethink.
Ahmed said that as part of the self-regulatory measures, e-sports operators have begun to increase the minimum age at which players under 18 can participate in competitions, although the government is likely to formulate the rules later.
“If you are between 16 and 18 years old and you are participating in an e-sports tournament, then you will no longer be able to do so,” Ahmed said.
He added that most players start to consider e-sports as a profession when they are 14, 15, or even younger. They were discovered at that age, and any restrictions on their training could be a major setback for any minor.
“It has the potential to substantially reduce the talent pool that e-sports organizations can choose from,” he said. “It may be more difficult to recruit the right people or the best people, and there may be some brain drain during the development stage.”
Treatment or feeding habits?
China has made great progress in gaming addiction, setting up special camps to free the addicted mind from the mental pollution of gaming, and adopting a gentler approach in youth mental health clinics across the country.
Recently, a clinic in Bao’an District tried to talk to staff and teenagers who might have problems with game time management, but was refused there. Publicity leaflets throughout the center openly discuss the problem of Internet addiction, and the staff said that they are making a big report on the problem of online game addiction. They declined to comment on the severity of the problem or any content in the upcoming report.
Ahmed said that while this may be a problem for some students, others just want to play and may persuade their parents to let them do it.
“It is worth noting that whether it is using the parent’s account or the parent letting the child play, there are some loopholes that can allow the child to play longer.[ting] They play longer, or if they want to, for example, use a VPN [virtual private network] Play the global game system and even buy a fake ID to pretend to be an adult. “
An employee in his 20s works at the counter of a gaming cafe. In the afternoon of a working day, there are about two dozen high-performance computers buzzing in the background. He said that he currently plays for about three to four hours a day. I started playing games when I was 13 years old.
“However, I think this is a good policy for children because they should focus more on learning,” he said, perhaps questioning his own life choices.
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